Engineering a Solution to Skilled Labor Shortage

Where there’s a will, there’s a skill – that’s the case for skilled training in the Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky area. We don’t need our Manufacturing Benchmarking Reports to show that training and recruiting/retaining skilled labor ranks among the top concerns facing leaders of local manufacturers year after year. There is a solution in the works.

Engineering a Solution: The European American Chamber of Commerce (EACC) has been fostering a relationship with Festo, a world-renowned training program to bring a first-of-its-kind skilled labor school to the US. In Europe,

German-based Festo is a household name synonymous equally for its pneumatic and electrical automation technology AND as provider of skills development of manufacturing and process automation.

Our area is an ever-growing hub for manufacturers and yet we just haven’t figured out the labor shortage. The EACC is working literally on a “ground-breaking” solution to bring a brick-and-mortar Festo school right here in our backyard.

Extruding Success: The next step in this process is for manufacturers to fill out a short survey (15 minutes or less) to help in the beginning stages of a feasibility study. Limited Time Only – There are other cities courting Festo for this initiative, so our success lies largely on our ability to quickly pull together local manufacturers to identify their needs and communicate them appropriately!

Carolin McCaffrey Director Business Development & Member Solutions with the EACCdescribes the skills initiative as “Leading and facilitating the collaboration between manufacturing companies, educational and community partners developing a German Dual Education based Apprenticeship Model that will generate a competitive workforce regionally and nationally supporting the growth of manufacturing companies in the Tri-State area and contribute to European business attraction.”